


Quicksilver

by moodiful819



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015), Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fae, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Blood, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, F/M, Fae!Kylo Ren, Sexual Tension, Slow Burn, Violence, War
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-31
Updated: 2018-02-26
Packaged: 2018-12-22 01:17:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,670
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11956668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moodiful819/pseuds/moodiful819
Summary: At first, it was amusing. After all, it wasn't every day that a knife could spurn its former owner, especially when that former owner was a Fae.But Rey wasn't laughing now. Instead, she was being taught how to fight in a war and save a people by the very Champion she was replacing. She wished she'd never found the stupid thing. She wished the knife would just take Kylo back. But a blade always chooses its owner--such is the way of the sword.Rey and Kylo were about to learn this lesson firsthand.





	1. Prologue: The Rat with a Knife

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Fae Kylo Ren](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/320004) by roselinath. 



She meets him with a knife at her jaw, neck held in his hand as he curses at her in a tongue that she surprisingly does not know (and coming from a trader planet, she knows too many).

Her confusion must show because then he curses again, spits, and slurs Common through a thickened tongue. She imagines it’s been years since he spoke it.

“How did you get this?” He spits again, blood from where she socked his jaw dripping from the corner of his mouth. It’s silver and glimmering, just like the blade he holds in his free hand.

He jars her against the tree he has pinned her again, and her eyes swim with stars as pain blooms behind her head.

“This blade is a relic of my family,  _rat_ ,” he seethes. “Now I will ask you again: how did you get this?”

It is either the anger he rises in her or the concussion. It’s the only way she can explain the bravado that possesses her as she sneers at him. “I got it as all rats do: I scavenged it.”

The satisfaction is like gold in her pocket and warm bread on her tongue. She hopes it’s worth it because she will never have either again, she thinks, as he draws the blade back to strike her.

The gurgle of her blood never comes, however. The edge disappears on her skin; she is unmarked. Her foe tries again and again with repeated failure and mounting frustration. In his anger, something foils him and he roars again. 

When she snickers, she feels another blow to her head from the tree. As she feels herself slip into the darkness, she catches sight of the large silvery gash in his palm and smirks to herself one last time.


	2. Chapter 1: A Rat is Asked to be a Hero

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the rat meets a queen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone! I'm sorry for such a long period of inactivity. Teaching and my mental health state kind of ate up all my motivation to write for a while, and then I had to rewrite this chapter a bunch of times. It's relatively short and abrupt, but I'd rather just have this as set up for the next chapter than torture myself more.
> 
> Next chapter will explain a lot of the things mentioned here. Until then, thank you for all your kudos and especially your lovely comments!

She wakes on a bed of leaves. It’s an odd feeling that she’s still getting used to. She’s already slept for a few days in the dirt and leaf litter, but the leaves underneath her aren’t the crisp material she is used to—dry and scratchy with the occasional stick jabbing into her side. Instead, it feels smooth and flexible, like what she imagined the insides of waterskins to feel like back when she was a child.

Fitful hands and the titter of voices blend in and out with the ringing of magic hovering over her. A blanket of foliage covers her, soft and thick and so unlike the scrap of cotton she covered herself with in her old home. It is so warm against the cold. 

She would almost feel comfortable if it wasn’t for the vines wrapped around her wrists and legs.

As she comes to, the hands retreat and she is suddenly face to face again with her attacker.

“What did you do to the blade, witch?” he demands.

Despite the slight wooziness that remains in her head, she apparently still has it in her to sass. “Witch? You flatter me, good sir. I am merely a humble–as you said before– _ rat _ .”

He snarls at her, and the sound of it sends a small army of attendants skittering to the edges of the room. They are alone, and it is by the light of a hearth of Talia’s fire that she is finally able to clearly see his twig-like horns and the thick mask of green over the top half of his face. The ringing and vines finally make sense: she’s in Fae territory.

He threatens her with the blade again and she laughs as the edge melts in his hand and the frustration in his expression visibly grows. “Having some trouble there, good sir?”

The vines bind her into a sitting position as he grasps her neck again. The knife is forgotten on the blanket of leaves and his free hand hovers in the air like talons ready to strike. 

“There is more than one way to cut your tongue out, you harpy–!”

A hand sweeps forward, older with much more measured finesse. 

“That’s  _ enough _ ,” its owner says. Her attacker yields and seems to bite his tongue with a similar simmering mood as he is cast aside. While he goes to stew somewhere, a woman steps forward from the doorway, dressed in regal gown of green and white. If Rey wasn’t bound to the bed, even she would be moved to kneel before this woman.

“I apologize for my son, Kylo.” She says this name as if it pains her, the letters just managing to tilt over the edge of her lips into the world. “He is a bit hot-headed and has little trust for the world outside. I am Leia, his mother and Leader of the Fae.”

Rey hesitates as to what to do next. Back on her old world, she was rarely bothered for her name. All people had been interested in was what she could scavenge and pilfer for them. It’s a welcome change for someone to be interested in  _ her. _

But she knows the old wives’ tales: giving your name to the fae was essentially the same as handing your life and soul to them. With your name, they were supposed to be able to steal your body and use it as they wished…

But that is no different from her life back on Jakku. She had been a slave in everything but name there until she had escaped. At least here, she might be slightly better off.

The inclination to lie lingers, though. If she gives a false name, it’s not as if “Kylo” or “Leia” would ever know—if those are even their true names.

But there is such a warmth in Leia’s eyes that it makes her want to lean into her and trust her. If this is some kind of fae magic, it is the worst kind. It makes her feel like she might belong somewhere, that she may have found a friend in this strange place. 

_ It gives her hope. _

She finally breathes her name. “I’m… Rey.”

Leia glows to hear it like the soft bloom of candlelight against the dark. Sitting beside her on the bed, Leia gives a wave of her hand and the vines relax their hold on Rey. She can’t run, but at least her hands are free—but even this gives the man in the corner cause to pace even more. 

Rey watches as Leia picks up the knife from the bed, studying its glint before meeting her eyes. 

“I haven’t seen this blade in over eighty years,” she whispers, more to herself than anyone else as she runs her fingers over the filigree. The leather around the handle is so old and worn, it’s a miracle it hasn’t fallen off completely. Silver vines balloon and knot around the hilt to create a basket guard while part of it drops off and melts into a spout of water. The blade glints as Leia shifts it in her grasp. The weight of it feels so foreign to her now, heavy like a river stone in her hand. 

“Almost three centuries old and it has never been dull until now,” she muses as she presses the edge of it against the meat of her thumb. It cuts no more than if she’d leaned into the edge of a table, and a dull one at that.

“My son told me a little about what happened before I came in here, but I had to see it for myself. I have a little theory I’d like to test out, Rey. Do you trust me?” she asks in a wily tone. Rey has only heard this tone in the most crazed of adventurers on Jakku, but this Leia says it with such warmth and such a tender smile that Rey would walk through the Lava Fields of Mustafar for her if she asked. 

Rey nods.

Holding Rey’s hand tightly, Leia positions the edge of the blade against Rey’s skin and tugs. Again, it does not pass, instead feeling like cool spring water over her skin. The second time, Leia closes the blade in Rey’s hand and guiding the grip, cuts across her own skin, drawing a silvery river over her flesh with a grimace.

Waving an attendant over, Leia places something that looks like a healing skin over the wound herself and applies pressure to the cut. 

“Rey, I know we have just met, but I must beg you to stay with us. We are at war. My people are in dire need and we need your help.”

Simmering all this time, Kylo roars to life behind Leia. “You can’t be serious! She’s an outsider, mother. She has obviously cursed grandfather’s blade! She–”

“That is enough.” Leia chills him with an icy stare and while Kylo does not shrink in front of the small woman, there is a slight stiffening in his posture as he swallows his anger with a practiced tongue. It is an amusing sight, and Rey would’ve enjoyed the mirth of it more if she hadn’t been so anxious over the fae queen’s words.

“With all due respect, ma’am, I believe your son is right. I’m just a scavenger–and a human one at that. I don’t know how to fight in a war, let alone a war for the fae.”

Leia hushes her son with a look before turning to the stranger in their care. “I understand that, but therein lies the problem. That blade–my father’s sword that you have brought back to us–has been missing for decades. It is the key to helping us win the war and saving our people.” 

Leia picks up the small blade from where it had fallen on the bed and watches as the metal glints in the low light of the room. “Unfortunately, magic is fickle, even to those blessed with it. This blade chooses its champion.” 

With a strange solemnity, Leia presses the knife into Rey’s hand, closing it tightly in the younger girl’s grip.

“I’m afraid, Rey, that it has chosen  _ you _ .”

 


End file.
